


give me comfort, give me edge

by playwrightfate



Series: Valia Hawke [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: And A Touch Of Angst, F/M, Fluff, Healing, Mentions of Blood, Purple Hawke, Serious Injuries, Talking nonsense as usual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-13 23:15:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29783577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/playwrightfate/pseuds/playwrightfate
Summary: Hawke asks Anders to move in. Her timing is a little weird though.
Relationships: Anders/Female Hawke, Anders/Hawke (Dragon Age)
Series: Valia Hawke [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2189148
Comments: 5
Kudos: 7





	give me comfort, give me edge

“It hurts,” Valia groaned as he eased her down on the cold, hard floor of her hallway. 

Oranna and Bodahn hurried towards them as they heard the door bursting open. She, let out a shriek at the view of Hawke’s bloodied body. Bodahn, swore. “Messere! What happened?”

“A Coterie ambush as we were coming home.” Anders had carried her away from the fight, which had erupted a few streets from there. Her friends were probably still fighting out there as he had brought her to safety. 

She was severely wounded. 

Anders sent Oranna and Bodahn looking for poultices and water basins and then kneeled down next to her, roaming his hands above her to check for all the injuries he could not see. She had been thrown against a wall by a mage. Among other things. 

“It fucking hurts,” she groaned again. 

“I know, love. Hang on. It will get better, I promise.”

Her eyes were starting to close. “Sleep. I wanna sleep,” 

He jerked her awake with his magic. “Don’t.”

“Hey stop!” she cried out in surprise. She hated when he did that. The sensation was irking. “That’s not fair. Lemme sleep…” She tried to push away his hands but could barely move her arm. 

“No, I can’t let you do that. You have to stay with me.” Her pulse was weakening. “Focus, Hawke. Sleeping is bad right now. It’s very bad.”

“Of course you’re the one saying that.” 

“What do you mean?” He said distractedly, anything to keep her talking and not passing out. If she lost consciousness now, he wasn’t sure he would be able to bring her back. 

“You _never_ sleep.”

“That’s not true. I slept here yesterday. And I’ll stay and sleep here tonight if you behave.”

She snorted but hissed right after. The pain came in waves, and sometimes it was almost unbearable. And her eyelids were so very heavy. Sleeping felt like such a good idea right now. “Can’t stay awake,” she mumbled as her eyes closed again, “just a minute, Anders.”

He used the same magic trick as before, and she grunted loudly. “Maker’s balls, you’re annoying.”

“I’m keeping you alive, that’s what I am. You have to stay with me, love.” He cupped her face. His hands shook. “Please.” The adrenalin of the fight was wearing out and all the focus it gave him with it. Now he felt drained and afraid, the idea of Hawke dying poisoning his thoughts, which should have only been focused on healing her wounds. It distracted him. Slowed him down. 

She must have caught something in his eyes then as she softened slightly under his gaze. “Ok, ok. You win, I’ll try. Tell me a story.”

“When you want to fall asleep? No way.” The hand focusing back on her chest found a punctured lung, the one on her abdomen found a worrying gash in her small intestine. He had to work quickly to stop the bleeding and cauterise and heal everything. She was losing too much blood and her breathing was shallower by the minute. “ _You_ tell me a story.”

She threw him the most annoyed stare she could muster. It probably looked more like a strange kind of smoldering look as her eyes kept trying to close. 

“You’re kidding me, right?” she rasped, wincing with pain, “everything freaking hurts. I can’t talk. You talk.”

“You’re doing very well right now.”

There was a moment of silence and he almost used his magic again to make sure she wasn’t falling asleep, but she stopped him with a weak push of her right arm. “Hey! Don’t! I’m here, I’m here. I hate that trick. It makes my bones buzz. It hurts.”

“Sorry, love. I had to.” 

A small silence again. He looked at her face. Her eyes were half-open, but he could see she was looking at him.

“You said you’d stay…” she breathed. 

“I will.” 

“But did you mean… sleep here or _sleep_ here,” she tried to say it with a smirk but the result was probably terrible. Not to mention her attempt to wiggle her brows, which was so invisible that Anders entirely missed it. 

He shot her an incredulous glare. “You’re emptying your blood on my hands and you’re asking me about having sex _tonight_?”

She tried to nod.

“Maker’s Breath, Hawke, you’re impossible.” He shook his head. “Believe me, the most action you’ll get tonight if I can heal you properly by then is a bath and a good night’s sleep. And that’s the best-case scenario for you right now," he warned her, "you won’t be able to do much more than this tonight. Nor any night in the near future,” he added quickly as he saw her about to say something. 

“Is that a challenge?”

“No. You’re almost half-dead, Hawke.”

“Well, that’s probably the rudest thing anyone’s ever said to me. And mind you, I’ve heard a lot of rude things in my life. Plus it still means I’m almost half alive, right?” She tried to say it with a grin, but it only made her cough. She could now barely speak without gasping for air, a rasp accompanying her every word. 

But Anders still chuckled at that, his tension easing a little. She was still there, she was still talking nonsense. That was a good sign. Or so he hoped. He had to do something about that lung real quick, though.

“So. You’ll–you’ll take the bath with me at least?”

“And bathe in your blood? No. I’ll clean your wounds, love. Then put you to bed.”

“You’re no fun.” 

It seemed to him than her tone and voice were getting weaker. “No, I told you before, the only thing I am tonight is keeping you alive.”

“That joke sucks.”

“Good, because it’s not a joke.” 

There was a pause again. She sighed in pain when he added more pressure on her abdomen.

“And you’ll come to bed with me?”

“Yes. _To sleep._ ”

Another pause.

“Hmm, that’s good too.” 

Her voice was barely audible now. Anders turned to her in alarm. Her eyes were closed again. He shook her, but she only grunted feebly in response. 

Maker, he was losing her!

“Hawke!” He shook her again, maybe a bit too strongly this time, but she remained unresponsive. “Valia!”

There was a slight spasm. Her eyelids quivered. “Hmm, you’ll stay in the morning then?” She murmured weakly, half coming back under his frantic gaze.

In his panic, he had forgotten about her last words. “What?!”

“Will–will you stay in the morning?”

“Of course I’ll stay. But you stay with me now.”

“Last time… last time you didn’t stay.”

Something clenched deep inside him. “And… and you’d like me to stay?” That really wasn’t the time to discuss this. 

“Yes,” she breathed, “You can stay all the time. _I_ would like you to stay all the time.”

_A home. He would have a real home. He could have a real home. With her._

“Hawke,” his voice wavered a little as her eyes were slowly opening again, as he saw her trying to fight the deceptive lull of sleep, “are you–are you emptying your blood on my hands, propositioning me,” he inhaled deeply, “and asking me to move in all in one night?”

_This will be a disaster._

Her nod was almost imperceptible. “We could take a cat. I’m sure Byron would get used to him quickly.”

Anders chuckled. Her eyes had a glassiness he did not like. He should be scrambling to heal her. But his thoughts were all over the place. “You don’t even like cats.”

“Not true. Never had one, that’s all. We could call him Ser Pounce-A-Little. In tribute as much as in hopeful prayer. Less mischief, maybe.”

He shook his head, looking at her fondly. “Would you tell the world, the knight-commander, that you love an apostate and you will stand beside him?”

_This will be a disaster._

“Do you want me to go write it with my own blood on her doorstep? Help me up.”

Anders laughed this time, and he cradled her face and kissed her bloody mouth, right here and then before resting his forehead against hers, forgetting everything for a moment. Even the idea of death.

She gave him a weak, wicked smile in response. “If that’s how you treat all your patients, you can stay at the clinic though.” 

It was surreal to feel so happy and afraid at the same time. She might die. They might live together. 

He smiled back and went back to tending to her wounds. “I’ll move in, then.” 

**Author's Note:**

> I have a lot more in store for these two! 
> 
> Also, the title was taken from a song by Helena Deland.
> 
> Thank you for reading and you can find me [@playwright-fate](https://playwright-fate.tumblr.com/) on tumblr :)


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